Hurricane Isaac Slows Gulf Production

Hurricane Isaac made landfall at 6:45 p.m. CT just west of New Orleans and the disturbance in the Gulf of Mexico had some industry experts expecting natural gas and domestic crude oil prices to bounce upward.

93% of Gulf oil production and 72% of natural gas output from the Gulf has been suspended.

Natural gas has been trending lower for most of the summer this year. New more efficient means of drilling for natural gas have U.S. domestic supplies on the high side. The United States Natural Gas Fund (UNG) did break it's downward trend Wednesday, but, despite the howling winds of Isaac, rose by only 2%.

The same is true of Gulf Crude Oil. Last week, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported gains of 3.8 billion barrels in the domestic supply holding the market value of a barrel of crude below the $100 mark.

As pipelines, refineries and drilling operations ride out the storm, crude oil output is expected to be off by 1,287,275 barrels per day, and natural gas production down 3,002 million cubic feet per day. In addition, 1,525,00 barrels of petroleum per day are shut in.

Spot gasoline prices on the Gulf coast have risen in response to this first hurricane of the season, but even during a production shut down, domestic reserves have crude oil and natural gas prices in check.